Tokyo Foodies Celebrate Young Chefs

It isn’t easy being a young chef in Japan. The pay stinks. The hours are long and inconvenient. The hierarchy in the kitchen is rigid – even more so in Japan than elsewhere, due to the ceremony and tradition associated with certain cuisines. One sushi master said it took him a decade of performing menial tasks like serving tea and cleaning before he was allowed to touch raw fish.

Creative young chefs do exist but not in large numbers, and the vast majority do not have the financial backing or wherewithal to open their own restaurants. From those limitations, the Gochiso project was born to help promote the talents of young Japanese chefs by hosting “pop-up” dinners around Tokyo. (Gochiso is Japanese for “feast.”)

The project—“to bring guerilla-style gastronomy to unconventional spaces” – is the brainchild of three women in their 30s who share a love of food and good wine and sake: Melinda Joe, a freelance writer; Chihiro Moriyama, a graphic designer; and Eriko Miyagawa, a film producer.

“We were at a get-together during Golden Week [a week-long public holiday in Japan] and we were talking about how young chefs don’t have the space to do anything, and a pop-up would be a great opportunity for them,” said Ms. Joe. “It took about a month to get everything together.”

The soft launch of the Gochiso project took place Saturday at their friend’s massive apartment in Shibuya, featuring the cooking of Maria Suzuki, who trained as a professional chef in France and worked at the Bouley Restaurant in New York for three years. Fourteen guests scattered throughout the apartment feasted on a nine-course dinner, which began with a crisp, fried eel with lemon foam and a milky sea urchin mousse. Highlights included the fresh tomato gelée (the tomatoes came from Aomori) and a perfectly smoked Iberian pork sparerib. Each course featured a wine or sake pairing, with the wine chosen by Michael Khoo, the president of WineInStyle, an importer of California wines. The entire meal, including the wine pairings, cost ¥11,000 (about $135) a head, and the ingredients used in each course – and their origins—were painstakingly explained.

The event was charming but lacked some polish, given it was the kick-off dinner. Ms. Joe, Ms. Moriyama and Ms. Miyagawa comprised the serving staff (they say they will hire servers in the future), and guests ate their sea urchin mousse with a fork, in the absence of small spoons – an oversight you would seldom see at a more traditional dining establishment.

Ms. Joe says the point is not to turn a profit, but to cover costs and to raise awareness of young emerging talent in Japan. The second dinner is already planned for July 22 and 23, this time in an art gallery in Ginza, and Ms. Suzuki will again be cooking. In the future, the aim is to encourage more chefs to participate and share their talent.

This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. Distribution and use of this material are governed by our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact Dow Jones Reprints at 1-800-843-0008 or visit www.djreprints.com.